News/Commentary

A real stunner: Joe’s Cabinet meetings were scripted, controlled

May 21, 2025 | | Print Article

In what may be the least surprising revelation in Jake Tapper’s new book on the covering up of Joe Biden’s senility, the former president’s handlers carefully controlled the environment at Cabinet meetings to hide his obvious unfitness.

Even though “Original Sin: President Biden’s Decline, Its Cover-Up, and His Disastrous Choice to Run Again,” which was penned by the CNN anchor and Alex Thompson of Axios, has been overtaken by news of Biden’s allegedly sudden prostate cancer diagnosis, the grim details of the Potemkin presidency are still seeping out amid an orgy of sympathy for the disgraced Democrat.

In excerpts published by The Hill, the book describes how Biden’s team scripted questions and relied on such aids as note cards and teleprompters and even used multiple cameras to cover for any gaffes that the cognitively challenged octogenarian might make.

“Before these meetings, White House staff called the various departments and agencies to figure out what they were going to ask the president so that answers could be prepared. The conversations were largely scripted, even after the press had left the room,” according to the authors.

“Some Cabinet secretaries felt that, in fact, Biden relied on the cards more heavily when reporters were absent,” according to the book, which anonymously quotes four Cabinet secretaries who came clean about the dishonesty by the former president’s team to present him as lucid and capable to the American public.

“The Cabinet meetings were terrible and at times uncomfortable — and they were from the beginning,” one unidentified secretary is quoted. “I don’t recall a great Cabinet meeting in terms of his presence. They were so scripted.” Another said that they hated “the scripts.”

ADVERTISEMENT

According to The Hill, Tapper and Thompson explained that “some aides argued that Cabinet meetings were always stiff and time-consuming and that Biden was more inquisitive in smaller meetings. And they weren’t too worried about his frequent use of note cards or a poor speech from time to time.”

The book reports that the Biden campaign conducted a staged town hall at a high school gymnasium in April 2024 for a commercial, making it appear as though the then-presumptive Democrat nominee was responding to questions “off the cuff” even though reporters were not allowed to attend the event and the campaign received the question in advance.

The outlet also cited the book to report that when a group asked the president to record a five-minute keynote address, the White House would usually respond that videos would only be one to two minutes and that the geriatric leader “still struggled with that.”

“To compensate for that, aides filmed Biden with two cameras instead of one. If Biden messed up, the edit was less obvious with a jump cut,” according to the book. “Other politicians use jump-cuts, but Biden aides noted to themselves how much more often they had to use them for the president.”

One video of Biden that was previously criticized for the obvious use of jump cuts was the short challenge to Trump for a debate posted by the then-president’s social media team last May.

ADVERTISEMENT

Trump gladly accepted, and the nationally televised CNN debate that was moderated by Tapper would prove to be Biden’s downfall, an emperor has no clothes moment that showed the nation that critics were right about his senility, making it impossible for it to be covered up any longer.

After much hype, “Original Sin” hit bookshelves on Tuesday to muted reaction after Sunday’s big surprise that Biden was just diagnosed with an “aggressive form” of prostate cancer that has metastasized to the bone, a conveniently timed announcement that has many smelling a rat and yet another cover-up, this one of his physical health.

Chris Donaldson
Latest posts by Chris Donaldson (see all)

Comment

We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.

Latest Articles